Weiss once noted that to write a screenplay for an Elvis
movie, "You had to make room for 12 songs, and they had to be
integrated." He and Anthony Lawrence's script for Roustabout was nominated
for a WGA award for best movie musical that year, losing out to Mary Poppins.

Weiss received credit for just one other screenplay
during his career — for The Sons of Katie Elder (1965), the Henry
Hathaway-directed film that starred John Wayne and Dean Martin.

Weiss was an associate of renowned producer Hal B.
Wallis, whose credits included The Maltese Falcon (1941), Casablanca (1942) and
several films starring Martin and Jerry Lewis. The writer was present when
Wallis, then based at Paramount Pictures, made Presley's screen test in March 1956.

"No one had any expectations; [Presley] was such a
strange, quiet fellow — so completely foreign," Weiss said in the 2004
book Elvis Presley: The Man. The Life. The Legend. "But he sang and read a
scene from [the N. Richard Nash play] The Rainmaker and answered questions
asked from off-screen — and it was phenomenal. It was an amazing experience to
be there, one of those life-changing experiences."

A native of Sharon, Pa., Harry "Allan" Weiss
served in the U.S. Army, was stationed in Germany and was as a translator
during the Nuremberg trials. He then graduated from UCLA and worked as a sound
engineer and in journalism.

Weiss' partner, producer Paul Nathan, who also worked
alongside Wallis, died in 1977. The two are buried near each other at the Hollywood
Forever Cemetery, Maas said.

About Me

Born in Toledo, Ohio in 1946 I have a BA degree in American History from Cal St. Northridge. I've been researching the American West and western films since the early 1980s and visiting filming sites in Spain and the U.S.A. Elected a member of the Spaghetti Western Hall of Fame 2010.